Teeming Links – September 13, 2013

Far Away from Solid Modernity (Revolution: Global Trends and Regional Issues)
Zygmunt Bauman on liquid modernity and our unfolding apocalypse. “[We live in a society] which, moving relentlessly towards the apocalypse, does not care (does not want to care or is not able to) about the security and well-being of human community spreading one’s ideas.”

The Tech Intellectuals (Democracy: A Journal of Ideas)
“The good, bad, and ugly among our new breed of cyber-critics, and the economic imperatives that drive them.” Henry Farrell argues that the “tech intellectual,” today’s version of the public intellectual, works in an “attention economy” that’s based on using digital media to attract enough notice to make a living by spreading one’s ideas.

Gobekli Tepe Was No Laughing Matter (Science 2.0)
“The circular stone enclosures known as the temple at Göbekli Tepe in southeastern Turkey remain the oldest of its kind, dating back to around the 10th millennium B.C. But Göbekli Tepe may also be the world’s oldest science building. Giulio Magli of the Polytechnic University of Milan hypothesizes it may have been built due to the ‘birth’ of a ‘new’ star; the brightest star and fourth brightest object of the sky, what we call Sirius (Greek for ‘glowing’). . . . Magli says this new star may have prompted a new religion that was not evident anywhere else. Or, as is the case of Stonehenge, it could have been a multi-purpose astronomical observatory that also became a religious site.”

Crimes Against Humanities (The New Republic)
Here is Leon Wieseltier’s brilliant rejoinder to Steven Pinker’s recent and deeply wrong-headed essay about the relationship between science and the humanities. “The superiority of the sciences to the humanities in Pinker’s account is made clear by his proposed solution to the crisis in the humanities: ‘an infusion of new ideas,’ which turns out to be an infusion of scientific ideas. There is nothing wrong with the humanities that the sciences cannot fix. . . . With his dawn-is-breaking scientistic cheerleading, Pinker shows no trace of the skepticism whose absence he deplores in others. His sunny scientizing blurs distinctions and buries problems.”

Beyond black: Laird Barron and the evolution of cosmic horror (Slate)
“What finally emerges from cosmic horror’s miasmic evolution over the course of the 20th century is a literary concept that is equal parts genre and philosophy, cerebral and primordial. . . . Enter the Alaskan-born Laird Barron, author of two novels and two previous story collections, who is equally concerned with mucusy gross-out and cosmic doom as he is with language, formal experimentation, and, above all, character.”

Teen’s hairy run-in with 7-footer probed as Bigfoot encounter (The Omaha World Herald)
“A hair sample found at the site was still being analyzed. A 15-year-old reported seeing the creature, which he said stood about 7 feet tall on two legs as it ran in front of the vehicle the youth was driving about 5:30 a.m. The creature then disappeared into the trees along the river. [Saunders County Sheriff Kevin] Stukenholtz, who became county sheriff six years ago after a long career with the Nebraska State Patrol, said he has no reason to believe the report was a hoax. . . . [Idaho State University anthropology and anatomy professor Jeff] Meldrum said he’s convinced that in the Pacific Northwest and other heavily wooded U.S. areas with proper rainfall there might be a ‘relic population of a rare primate.'”

Unafraid of alienating themselves (Portland Press Herald)
“Two Maine men who claim they were abducted by extraterrestrials aren’t shy about retelling their stories. . . . In the world of ufology — the oft-marginalized study of unidentified flying objects and the accompanying foreign beings that purportedly interact with people on Earth — the ‘Allagash incident’ ranks among the most substantiated in the United States.”

Related

About Matt Cardin

Teeming Brain founder and editor Matt Cardin is the author of DARK AWAKENINGS, DIVINATIONS OF THE DEEP, A COURSE IN DEMONIC CREATIVITY: A WRITER'S GUIDE TO THE INNER GENIUS, and the forthcoming TO ROUSE LEVIATHAN. He is also the editor of BORN TO FEAR: INTERVIEWS WITH THOMAS LIGOTTI and the academic encyclopedias MUMMIES AROUND THE WORLD; GHOSTS, SPIRITS, AND PSYCHICS: THE PARANORMAL FROM ALCHEMY TO ZOMBIES; and HORROR LITERATURE THROUGH HISTORY.

Movements of static charge between materials takes place spontaneously, in all cases, the charges equalize or the material with the greater charge gives charge to the less charged material. This sometimes occurs as an immediate discharge and sometimes it’s very slow, but in all cases this goes on until the settlement of the value of their energy potentials. The human body and basically every living substance has charge. Each cell is from a physical point of view also a bearer of electric charge. Therefore, in some cases the energy in our bodies goes away spontaneously, in other cases, it is obtained spontaneously. How this happens during various different circumstances is mentioned at http://www.miroslavprovod.com

It follows that we live in an environment where this little known factor – the static charge – can be harmful in excess, while in other cases, it may be beneficial to our health. The electrons from the external world can subtly manipulate the processes going on in our body. In case of an absence or on the other hand an excess it may interfere with body immunity, and may also cause health complications.

Current medicine does nothing to address the value of the charge of our body. It actually does not deal with the amount of charge on our cells, of which our body is composed. Doctors remove only the consequences of a possible overvoltage or under-charge of the ideal amount of our physical charge; the causes of the disease whose nature is often in the outer harmful energy effects, are not dealt with.

Medicine, as a discipline, is not the only science that does not deal with the negative effects of static electricity on the cell membranes of humans. In other fields, such as architecture, the environment, chemistry, physics and other fields, the static charge changes the properties of the matter.

It is remarkable that the ancient cultures already knew about the effect of static charge on human health. Archeologists have shown that hundreds of thousands of pieces often made of a hundred ton massive rock, were deployed across the country. Occasionally someone would move a small rock for a short distance by the use of towing ropes and announces that rocks of great weight were transported in the same way. This however does not sound plausible. Scientists have dealt with this issue in the course of history without success and the colossal work of our ancestors ended up in mysteries.

If we would like to solve that megalithic “Gordian knot”, we first need to postpone the widely known “textbook knowledge” and go back to prehistoric times and responsibly look at the mystery of megaliths, which may hide some help in the same way as monastic libraries do. It can not be overlooked that the sacred buildings of all kinds were located in the vicinity of watercourses, the zones of natural sources of static electricity. The matter of these structures accumulates static charge, which is then spontaneously transformed into organisms of worshipping believers. This process was magnified by burning candles. This used to be used centuries ago but the laws of physics haven’t changed since. This energy transformation process in the bodies of visitors is identical in the church buildings of stone masonry of all kinds at present as well. Energy gain is perceived as pleasant feeling. Conversely, a close contact with a person that is energetically weak can feel uncomfortable. The friction between two objects with different dielectric constant creates a static charge and this is a physical fact that has been known for centuries. In the last century, the fact that water flows generate static electricity was, perhaps intentionally, neglected. Sacral structures accumulate static charge in their mass – energy that is produced by mutual friction of two diverse non-conductive or poorly conductive materials – running water, shorelines and bottom of the watercourse. The first material are the water molecules, the second material is a rock through which the water flows.
If we can not understand everything on earth without justification and put it rather off into the realm of miracles, see e.g. water, rock, Lourdes, it would be broadly beneficial, if we focus more intensely on the research of the often neglected natural force – static charge (electricity), and its properties that are still unknown.

About

The Teeming Brain explores news, trends, and developments in religion, horror, science fiction, fantasy, the paranormal, creativity, consciousness, and culture. It also tracks apocalyptic and dystopian trends in science, technology, politics, ecology, economics, the media, the arts, education, and society at large. Its founder and primary author is Matt Cardin.

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Praise for the Teem

FOR MATT CARDIN:

"[Dark Awakenings is] a thinking-man's book of the macabre...Cardin's tales are rich with references to Lovecraft, Nietzsche, and other writers whose work gives them unusual philosophic depth." – Publishers Weekly

“It’s a bold writer who, in this day and age, tries to make modern horror fiction out of theology, but Cardin pulls it off.” – Darrell Schweitzer

“In the tradition of Poe and Lovecraft, Cardin's accomplishments as a writer are paralleled by his expertise as a literary critic and theorist.” – Thomas Ligotti

“Matt Cardin is one of those rare horror authors who is also a true scholar and intellectual.” – Jack Haringa

FOR RICHARD GAVIN:

"Literate horror fans who have yet to encounter Canadian author Richard Gavin are in for a treat. The lyrical prose is often at a higher level than usual presentations of otherworldly demons and malevolent forces." – Publishers Weekly

"Richard Gavin is one of the bright new stars in contemporary weird fiction. His richly textured style, deft character portrayal, and powerful horrific conceptions make every one of his tales a pleasure to read." – S. T. Joshi

"Gavin's storytelling can be masterly. As with Machen and Blackwood at their best, an epiphany or illumination is achieved, though Gavin's mysticism is darker and distinctly his own." – Wormwood

FOR STUART YOUNG:

"No one can accuse Stuart Young of avoiding the big issues -- with insight and verve, he tackles head-on the existence of God, the mystery of human consciousness and the transformative effects of psychedelic drugs." – Mark Chadbourne